Former NFL Quarterback Jim McMahon Says Marijuana Helps Players

Last week former NFL quarterback and Super Bowl Champion Jim McMahon spoke at the Cannabis World Congress and Business Expo in New York City, and he had a lot to say about cannabis.

In fact, many former NFL players have a lot to say about cannabis. NFL veterans like former Giants defensive end Leonard Marshall, former Broncos tight end Nate Jackson, former Broncos wide receiver Charlie Adams and former Jaguars offensive tackle Eben Britton were all part of a panel at the Expo and they all say marijuana would have helped them and would help current players much more than deadly and addictive prescription painkillers.

“Juxtaposing my experiences with pharmaceutical drugs like Vicodin and Percocet, that made me angry and irritable, frustrated, didn’t get rid of any of the pain, made it difficult to sleep, increased my heart rate and made me feel crazy,” Britton said, and “on the other side of that there’s cannabis that helped me sleep, put me into a healing state of being where I was relieved from stress and anxiety as well as feeling the pain relief.”

“Hundreds of thousands of people are dying from (painkillers) and there’s not one case of people dying from the hemp plant,” McMahon said. As the most famous of the former players advocating openly for access to medical cannabis in the NFL, McMahon tends to draw the media’s attention, but the list of players who agree with him is growing and includes current players like offensive tackle Eugene Monroe.

Marijuana is currently on the NFL’s list of banned substances and there is little hope that will change anytime soon. Sadly, this means a lot more suffering for players who are punished for using a medicine that is much healthier for them and cannot be considered a “performance enhancer” any more than pain pills are.